Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a person of mixed race.

[1880		Richmond Dispatch (VA) 19 Sept. 2/5: Colonel Goode speaks at Sandy Point [...] and the ‘Brass Ankles’ are going to give him an old-fashioned reception].
1926		Index-Jrnl (Greenwood, SC) 6 Sept. 8/2: We call the inhabitants of ‘Hell Hole’ ‘Brass Ankles’ a name generally given in that section to half breeds.
1928		E.C.L. Adams ‘Brass Ankles’ in Nigger to Nigger 71: Calls dey self white – / Brass ankles dey is – / White wid a little tech er yellow.
1930		Eve. News (Harisburg, PA) 24 Nov. 24/1: The brass ankle is a combvination white, negro and Indian — the most despised and hated of all mixed breeds.
1931		Shelby & Stoney Po’ Buckra 402: Worse than a nigger! I’m a brass-ankle.
1940		Times (Hammond, IN) 26 June 26/5: The people in South carolina who are called ‘brass ankles’ are mixed blooded. [...] They have schools to themselves , not being allowed in white and refusing to attend Negro schools.
1951		Fairbanks News-Miner (AK) 18 Oct. 3/1: The Brass Ankles were a people of mixed Negro and white blood [...] Socially they were outcasts.
1967		in DARE.
1975		Democrat & Chron. (Rochester, NY) 27 Dec. 36/3: The so-called Brass Ankles of South Carolina.
1985		(ref. to late 19C) Index-Jrnl (Greenwood, SC) 31 Mar. 26/5: The brass ankle people of Dorchester County, racially mixed stock who kept themselves apart and would not mix with either white or black men.

(US) a general term of abuse.

1957		Laurents & Sondheim West Side Story II i: His way! [...] Look at the brass-ass run!
1970		E. Thompson Garden of Sand (1981) 429: Two sailors went inside and came right back out. One said, ‘Fuckin brass-asses.’.

(US) insolent, shameless.

1954		(con. 1920s–30s) J.O. Killens Youngblood (1956) 35: You got more nerve than a brass-ass monkey.
1974		J. Millard Thunderbolt and Lightfoot 6: There can’t be any more brass-assed nerve left in the country. That bastard’s got a corner on it all [HDAS].
1983		A. Fulton ‘You Can’t Rhumboogie in a Ball and Chain’ in Missouri Review VII 84: The way you chugged booze straight, without a glass, / your brass-assed language, slingbacks with jeweled heel, / proclaimed you no kin to their muzzled blood.
1993		D. Tracy Living Year to Year Ch. iii: The Admiral’s face grew red with anger. ‘I don’t like it when some brass-assed Senator tries his best to get revenge on an injured man. I want his butt on a plate.’.
2003		D. Hart Shadows in Replay 33: That two-bit, brass-assed bastard. He’s behind all this? He was your CO at Benning, right?
2012		D. Corbett Done for a Dime [ebook] An abscond on a two-year-old warrant, an elderly woman—only a brass-assed head case would want to prosecute.

see separate entries.

(US black) a drum kit.

1948

Dan Burley ‘Back Door Stuff’ 20 Nov. [synd. col.] My man, Sonny Greer, has his ‘brass beds’ all set up and showed [...] what a real drummer can do.

(UK juv.) a police officer.

1959

I. & P. Opie Lore and Lang. of Schoolchildren (1977) 395: Nicknames current among boys [...] Bogey, Brass Bonce, Busy Bee.

1. (US) a soldier, esp. an officer; also attrib.

c.1863		in Allan Lone Star Ballads (1874) 116: Throughout the kind of Dixie ! / Swelling round with gold lace plenty, / See the gay ‘brass button’ gentry .
1871		J.W. DeForest Overland 155: You army fellers run me pootty close [...] I don’t want to fight brass buttons. They're too many for me.
1887		Courier-Journal (Louisville, KY) 3 May 1/2: The Army and Navy people ruled in Washington society [...] Many wealthy civilians were anxious to get into the giddy whirl, but they were barred out by the brass-button brigade.
1920		H. Wiley Wildcat 238: ‘What outfit do you belong to?’ the brass button man asked.
1936		M. Levin Old Bunch (1946) 169: He might have known that brass button would have no sense of humor.
1972		(con. 1930s–40s) N. Conway Bloods 110: Not all the brass buttons in Europe Could give half the faith and the trust That we learned from the boys on manoeuvres.

2. (US) a police officer; thus brass-buttoned adj.

1905		McClure’s Mag. Sept. 466: I don’t want to see a brass button on this block until I give the word. It would mean a riot .
1914		N.Y. Times 8 Feb. n.p.: Being fully aware of the respect that the negro has for brass buttons [...] the officer went single-handed to the negro’s house for the purpose of arresting him.
1927		Nichols & Tully Twenty Below Act I: You, you brass buttoned bastard: shut that god-dam door. (The Constable goes).
1935		F. Nebel ‘Winter Kill’ in Goulart (1967) 114: Them brats [...] yelled at me ‘Brass buttons, blue coat, couldn’t catch a nanny goat’.
1949		‘Hal Ellson’ Duke 76: Too many brass buttons been around.
1961		J. Scarne Complete Guide to Gambling.

3. a train conductor.

1945

F.H. Hubbard Railroad Avenue 334: Brass Buttons – Passenger conductor on railroad or streetcar line.

an impudent person; also as adj., impudent; thus brass-faced adj.

[c.1595		Shakespeare Love’s Labour’s Lost V ii: Thus pour the stars down plagues for perjury. Can any face of brass hold longer out?].
[1599		Jonson Every Man Out of his Humour I i: That brass-visaged monster Barbarism].
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 16: Brass-face an impudent person of either sex, whether with a red face or not.
1844		Cork Examiner 17 Apr. 4/3: Sometimes, when your dupes are nigh, / Brass-face cannot do without him, / Mountebank knows why.
1854		Democrat & Sentinel (Ebensburg, PA) 26 Oct. 1/5: Self-confidence is a good deal of an institution. A brass face is about as sure to lead to a golden poicket as it is to show up an empty brain.
1868		Jeffersonian (Stroudsburg, PA) 28 May 2/2: There was in it neither the flippancy of the brass-faced school-boy, nor the pomposity of a senatorial effort.
1876		Dly Astorian (Astoria, OR) 23 May 1/2: Some gambling sharper with [...] a swallow-tailed coat and a brass face with humbug written all over it.
1877		Keowee Courier (Pickens Court House, SC) 29 Nov. 4/3: We must dash ahead and cut our way through those brass-faced scoundrels.
1882		St Tammany Farmer (LA) 12 Aug. 1/4: Now then, you brass-faced old tramp, you move on.
1888		Stark Co. Democrat (Canton, OH) 21 June 1/2: With less whiskey, less noise, and less brass faced audacity, they could do much better work.
1907		Ward Co. Indep. (ND) 19 Sept. 1/2: The brass-faced individual who took an umbrella from the Indepedent office last Friday.
1910		Arizona Republican (Phoenix, AZ) 25 Aug. 12/3: Yes, friends, it is this same Gazette, this brass-faced hypocrite [...] slandering law-abiding and peace-loving communities .
1920		Kansas City Sun (MO) 3 July 4/1: He stepped into a barber-shop [and] delivered them to the brass-faced boy in charge.
1926		‘Ford Madox Ford’ Man Could Stand Up 271: They all yelled ‘Hullo Duckfoot . . . Hullo Brassface!’.
1957		J. Braine Room at the Top (1959) 90: And you’re not shy, you’re brass-faced, in fact.
1988		S. Selvon Eldorado West One 53: You! Shy! A bold brass-face reprobate like you shy?
2000		R. Antoni Grandmother’s Erotic Folktales 150: A brassfaced, big-mouthed, blue-striped, balloon-bellied son-of-peacock.

something of the utmost insignificance; usu. in phr. I don’t give a brass farthing.

1685		J. Crowne Sir Courtly Nice I i: A rambling woman [...] will be apt to bring her virtue as a traveller does his money, from a broad piece to a brass farthing.
1695		Congreve Love for Love I i: Your being in love with a lady that did not care a farthing for you in your prosperity.
1706		Farquhar Recruiting Officer II iii: Not a brass farthing, sir.
1771		Smollett Humphrey Clinker (1925) I 55: Mr. O. Frizzle assures me he values not her portion a brass farthing.
1786		‘Peter Pindar’ ‘Farewell Odes’ Works (1794) I 169: Not one brass farthing for their Master caring.
1794		W. Godwin Caleb Williams (1966) 91: Why she does not owe you a brass farthing: she has always lived upon your charity!
1802		G. Colman Yngr Poor Gentleman II i: It doesn’t signify a brass farthing what they are called.
1805		Chester Chron. 29 Nov. 3/1: I don’t care a brass farthing for exaggeration.
1820		Cumberland Pacquet 4 Jan. 3/2: They care not a brass farthing.
1834		(con. 1737–9) W.H. Ainsworth Rookwood (1857) 206: If you had done the job, Balty, it would not have signified a brass farden.
1834		C. Dance Pleasant Dreams Scene i: I don’t care a brass farthing for anybody!
1845		Tipperary Free Press 15 Oct. 1/5: Cromwell replies:- It don’t matter a brass farthing to me.
1852		Dublin Eve. Mail 26 May 2/4: Is there [...] a single politician of any school [...] who would give a brass farthing to decide the momentoes question.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor II 154/2: I can go now and pick up my four or five bob a day, where another wouldn’t know how to get a brass farden.
1864		G.A. Sala Quite Alone I 52: I’m sure we’d wait for better times, and never trouble you for one brass farthing.
1880		E.J. Milliken ‘Cad’s Calendar’ in Punch Almanack n.p.: Otherwise don’t care not one brass farden, / For the best ever blowed in Covent Garden.
1896		B.L. Farjeon Betrayal of John Fordham 293: ‘Are you goin’ to pay wot yer owe me?’ arst Maxwell. ‘Not one brass farden,’ Louis answered.
1900		Boy’s Own Paper 1 Dec. 138: I haven’t a brass farthing this week.

courage, nerve; a brave person.

1942		Berrey & Van Den Bark Amer. Thes. Sl.
1947		T. Thursday ‘Billy the Kidder’ in Blue Ribbon Western Nov. 🌐 The way he faced the Zizzen bums took gold-plated guts.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 32: brass guts A brave person.
1952		J. Jones From Here to Eternity (1998) 278: That takes a lot of guts [...] Brass guts.

a senior officer in the police or services; thus brass-hatted/brazen-hatted adj.; also attrib.

1893		Kipling ‘In the Rukh’ in Many Inventions 223: I tell you der big brass-hat pizness does not make der trees grow.
1904		Kipling ‘The Bonds of Discipline’ in Traffics and Discoveries 73: There’s a crowd of brass-’atted blighters there which will say I’ve been absent without leaf.
1915		‘Ian Hay’ First Hundred Thousand (1918) 145: The brazen-hatted strategist who drew up the operation orders. [Ibid.] 173: I will give you your first lesson in the Tactical Handling of Brass Hats.
1919		W.H. Downing Digger Dialects 13: brass-hat (n.) — An officer of superior rank.
1929		(con. 1916) F. Manning Her Privates We (1986) 80: I begin to look on all officers [...] and brass-hats as the natural enemies of deserving men like myself.
1932		(con. WWI) L. Mann Flesh in Armour 15: He stared at a brass-hat and insolently neglected to salute him.
1938		X. Herbert Capricornia (1939) 201: I’m in the gun already with the brass-hat brigade.
1941		A. Gurney Bluey & Curley 6 June [synd. cartoon strip] Did you notice the old brass hat with the red beak.
1946		T. Thursday ‘Once Upon a Crime’ in Crack Detective Sept. 🌐 If you and the other brass hats would observe the crooks and murderers around town [...] you might get some place.
1959		G. Slatter Gun in My Hand 183: The battalion might’ve invited the brass hats along.
1965		F.J. Hardy Yarns of Billy Borker 147: Some idiot brass-hat told me this was a man’s outfit.
1978		(con. 1940s) J.G. Farrell Singapore Grip 86: These days unless you were a brass hat or a Minister nobody knew when you would arrive.
1999		Indep. Rev. 18 June 14: It makes the brasshats sweat a bit.

1. (US) a fool [the hardness].

1966

in A.K. Turner Playboy Bk of Science Fiction 144: Even the dumbest brass-head you ever knew thinks.

2. (W.I.) a black person who has a reddish tint to their hair – the result of a diet lacking sufficient protein [the colour].

1950

Bennett, Clarke & Wilson Anancy Stories and Dialect Verse 79: [song title] Brass Head Jimmy.

a brothel.

2001

K. Sampson Outlaws (ms.) 94: Always getting off without paying at some brass-house or getting sisters to go down on each other or something.

(UK tramp) left-over food, scraps.

1803		Wonderful and Scientific Museum I 111: Like several of his fraternity [...] he had certainly established a walk, where he collected what has been called skran and brass knocker; ‘a portion’, or the whole of which, is generally disposed of on an evening, at the public houses used by the mendicant or begging tribe, to poor women, who come there for the purpose of purchasing.
1873		Sl. Dict. 95: Brass-Knocker broken victuals. Used by tramps and cadgers.
1909		J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

see knuck n. (3)

see separate entries.

(US) a general intensifier, e.g. I don’t give a brass-mounted cuss.

1881		‘Bill Nye’ Bill Nye and Boomerang 198: The great, throbbing world [...] don’t care a brass-mounted continental cuss one way or the other.
1883		‘Mark Twain’ Life on the Mississippi (1914) 25: Whoo-oop! I’m the old original iron-jawed, brass-mounted, copper-bellied corpse-maker from the wilds of Arkansaw!
1912		Salt lake Trib. (UT) 29 Dec. 42/2: He doesn’t care a brass mounted continental whether his son and heir succeeds.
1915		Mt Sterling Advocate (KY) 2 June 2/5: The public doesn’t give a brass mounted continental about methods.

see brass n.²

(US prison) a senior prison officer.

1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1969		‘Iceberg Slim’ Pimp 47: He’s been the brass nuts here for a double dime.

a professional man.

1921

D.L. Sayers Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club (1977) 209: Retired Army surgeon, with a brass plate and a consulting room in Harley Street – shares the house with two other hard-up brass-platers.

(US tramp) a telegraph operator.

1902		Trans-communicator 19 615: Just take the brass pounder as he labors through life, / As he toils through night and day, / With all of his troubles and trials and strife, He also gets very poor pay.
1926		QST 10 55: With international communication a daily and nightly occurrence it is of no value to the brass-pounder to know that his signals have been heard at intermediate points in the U.S. or Canada.
1931		Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 36: brass pounder.–A telegraph operator, one who pounds the brass key.
1938		L. Beebe High Iron 219: Brass-Pounder: Telegrapher.
1945		Life 29 Oct. 115: Go in, and you'll see a guy harnessed to a headphone. He's the brass pounder: the op.

(US) a bar; thus brass railer n., one who frequents bars.

1928		T.A. Dorgan in Zwilling TAD Lex. (1993) 19: There ain’t no more brass rails and he never spent a dime on licker anyway.
1943		W. Guthrie Bound for Glory (1969) 343: Bar flies, brass railers.
1964		L. Hairston ‘The Winds of Change’ in Clarke Harlem, USA (1971) 320: I set in a Brass Rail on Eighth Avenue and tightened my nerves with a few slugs of imperial.
1968		(con. 1928) S. Gore Holy Smoke 47: Looking as cool as if they all had a foot on the brass rail in the Australia, with a schooner of slops apiece in their mitts.

see separate entry.

(US black) a senior officer of the police or armed services.

1947

M.H. Boulware Jive and Sl.

see get down to brass tacks under brass tacks n.

see play boldface under boldface adj.

see put the tin hat on under tin hat n.¹